1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of describing data to be shared by a plurality of network-connected terminals over a network, within a set of program instructions.
2. Description of the Related Art
Methods to describe data or objects within program instructions executable by terminals equipped with processing means are well known. The development of higher-level programming languages (HLPLs) such as C or C++, has lead to an increased efficiency of processor usage for any given application programmed with this type of language, and also resulted in productivity improvements in terms of application development indeed, an additional benefit of said HLPS, also known as object-oriented programming, is the ability for programmers to develop reusable software components, or portions of a set of programming instructions.
With electronic communication in leisure or business activities becoming increasingly important, most programs utilised within the scope of those activities are today required to share objects over networks, such as local area networks or the Internet. In this context, object-oriented programming traditionally resorts to message-based networking solutions, wherein programmers implement program instructions pertinent to the passing of packets of data between network sockets according to various internet protocols. The implementation of the object sharing portion of instructions within a set of program instructions is traditionally fairly expensive as much development time is spent writing said networking instructions in order for those to accurately manage the sharing of existing classes of objects, which are usually implemented at first within said program instructions set for local processing.
The implementation of networking instructions requires extensive further testing of the functionality of the overall program over networks prior to commercial release in addition to the initial testing of the program instructions for programming faults, which is traditionally executed locally. Said expenses are further compounded by the number of independent types of user terminal, or ‘platforms’, a program developer wishes to publish its program instructions for, as said platforms traditionally require specifically-adapted instantiations of the same instructions set and thus artificially increase the development time and resources required to generate the executable instructions set.
The present invention provides a higher-level programming language (HLPL) easily comprehensible by those skilled in the art, which describes objects to be shared by network-connected terminals at the onset of the writing of a set of program instructions, wherein network instructions are embedded within the object classes and thus do not require additional network-specific instructions to be implemented within the main program instructions set. This solution facilitates testing of the overall program over networks throughout the development of the project instead of said testing being carried out at the end. The platform independent characteristic of the HLPL according to the invention further reduces the financial overhead generated by a multiple-platform commercial release, as the objects to be shared need be described according to said HLPL only once.